The Ottomans were a huge historical power, and they took part in World War I on the side of Germany and Austria-Hungary if memory serves, yet I only know that because I played Civ V and looked up their Civilopedia page. Which surprises me, considering I feel I should've heard about such a major political power before. Before I started that game I had never heard of the "Ottomans" before in any history lessons about WWI, or in any other historical connection.
I have a pretty bad memory sometimes, so it is possible my history books might've simply called them "turks". In any case, I feel like I've heard incredibly little of the Ottoman empire, considering the fact that they were a major european political power for several centuries.
Is it just me, or is the Ottoman largely ignored when teaching students european history?
I don't think you're imagining things as what you're describing is a pretty classic case of Euro-centrism. There's no great answer as to why this has been done, and obviously there will be plenty of history books that don't do this.
If you'd like some examples let me know and I can try to help point you towards some interesting books.
Is it just me, or is the Ottoman largely ignored when teaching students european history?
I find this strange, because the Ottomans had a huge impact on European history. When I was in high school (I'm from Europe), we talked about the Ottomans a lot (granted, I took extra history classes so that may have had something to do with that).